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Re: politics

Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2004-10-25 16:30

There's no satisfactory answer.

Leni Riefenstahl was a deeply committed Nazi, who was one of the regime's most effective advocates. Her film Olympia is a work of art that simultaneously glorifies Hitler and his ideals. Triumph of the Will stirs something in me, even though I'm Jewish and have relatives who went to the death camps. I felt a profound conflict when I saw these films, with esthetic and even emotional response clashing with nausea at the evil these people wrought.

Eduard Pernkopf made amazingly accurate and detailed anatomical drawings that are still in use. He was also a Nazi and inorporated tiny swastikas and SS symbols, and at least some of the drawings may be of concentration camp victims. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/medmurder.html. The Nazi symbols have been deleted from current editions. Nevertheless, it's a difficult decision whether the use of his drawings to train physicians and other savers of lives can justify using the work of a monster.

Even worse, the Nazis performed infamous experiments on concentration camp victims (which you'll have to Google yourself to find -- they're too sickening to link to), to find the limits of human endurance (e.g., how long a person can be immersed in ice water and still be revived, and what the most effective revival methods are). This information is medically valuable. Should this information, which is not reproducible in any other way, be used? Is there some point at which the information itself becomes tainted?

I take it as given that the Flick Collection contains great works of art, well worth seeing. On the other side is the owner's association with and benefit from the Second Reich. There are any number of arguments and counter-arguments. The Flick family member who benefited directly from the Nazis was the current owner's grandfather. Should the grandfather's sins be visited on the grandchildren? On the other hand, the grandchildren have inherited the ill gotten wealth.

There are many good arguments, and no satisfactory answer. Many Jews will not listen to Wagner or own a German car. After some thought about it, I do both. It's each person's individual decision.

Best regards.

Ken Shaw

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politics new

Markus Wenninger

2004-10-25 12:27